Undeterred by a lack of quorum at a public hearing in mid-March, opponents of a proposed mixed-use development turned up in person and online last week to share their concerns with the Village of New Paltz Planning Board.
The applicant, Westview Development, LLC, proposes to build a three-story mixed-use building within the village’s Neighborhood Business Residential Mixed-Use (NBR) Zoning District, including 124-residential units and 7,400-square-feet of ground-level retail space at 147-149 and 151 North Chestnut Street. To facilitate the development, the applicant is seeking to merge two parcels into a single 4.74-acre lot.
The site plan includes a pedestrian plaza along North Chestnut and a courtyard expanding between two wings of the building which stretches back toward the Wallkill Valley Rail Trail. Around 39 percent of the premises would be dedicated to open space. Elsewhere in the plan, the ground-level retail facing the street would be spread across five storefronts. The majority of a planned 168 parking spaces would be situated behind the new building, with the remaining eleven land-banked on-street parking.
“The Applicant believes that the design of the (as yet unnamed) Project — which introduces pedestrian and bicyclist-friendly infrastructure and streetscape improvements, together with a mix of residential, commercial and associated amenities — will achieve an important balance between the goals of furthering the efforts to revitalize the North Chestnut Street Corridor and promoting environmental benefits that further mitigate against any potential impacts,” reads Westview’s submission.
The proposal is currently under review by the village planning board, and after the meeting held on Tuesday, April 1, the public hearing remains open. Several people spoke during that segment of the public hearing, including Samuel Kniffen, who opposed the project as being out of character with the village.
“Continuing to make these developments here is think it’s fundamentally going to alter the character and the community of New Paltz,” Kniffen said. “Someone I know showed me an image of the proposed developments…they look hideous to me. I’ve experienced working in old buildings, specifically in Kingston, and they’re very nice looking. I don’t know why we have to put ugly buildings in our community.”
Abby Green shared concerns that the size of the proposal is far larger than other mixed-use developments along North Chestnut, like Zero Place, which opened a few years ago.
“My issue is really the scale of the project and whether it is going to be part of the community,” Green said. “This is three times the size of Zero Place, which really makes it the first of its kind as a structure. So I think, is this the direction that we want to go in? Or do we want to fulfill the need for housing with smaller and smaller projects, maybe have more projects that have been scaled down to a smaller business of ours, so that you’re not seeing this giant eyesore?”
Other residents cited a range of potential concerns with the proposed development, including traffic, an insufficient amount of parking and the possibility of pollution entering the Wallkill River.
“I’d like to talk about the volume of sewage that’s going to be generated,” said Leonard Loza. “I’m hoping that the calculations have been done that can be presented to the village so that we do not get fined for dumping raw effluents into the Wallkill, as we have been fined many times in the past. We have a zero runoff law in the village (and) I’m hoping within anything that there will be an oil-water separator there so that the oil stays here, and as the water is discharged into the Wallkill, it does not contain any oil products.”
Jason Taylor said he was generally in favor of the project, but questioned whether the proposed residential scenario is equitably distributed to meet the local housing crisis.
“It would be great if these new buildings that come online do offer a mix of housing opportunities for families with children rather than a design like this that has such a preponderance of studios and one-bedrooms,” Taylor said.
Of the 128 planned residential units, the majority are either studio or one-bedroom. Thirty of the units are two-bedroom.
“If you want to make this something that can accommodate families in the area…then that’s something to address,” Taylor said.
Kitty Brown agreed.
“People just can’t raise a family here anymore,” she said. “And the emphasis on studios and one bedrooms (in the proposal) is really in a sense kind of discriminatory against young families.”
The public hearing will remain open at least through the next meeting of the planning board, scheduled for Tuesday, April 15.
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